This international interdisciplinary project is conducted by the Institute of Education at the National research university Higher School of Economics (Moscow) in partnership with the World Bank. The project involves researchers working on the analysis of higher education system changes in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan.

The purpose of the study is to investigate the institutional landscape in higher education systems within post-Soviet states as a consequence of various factors and influences. The main aims of the study are; to track the major transformations in higher education and the contextual transformations of each system of higher education, to grasp the uniqueness of the Soviet legacy in each of the former Soviet republics and, ultimately, come to an understanding of the core issues which cause higher education structural change within the countries of the study.